Category: First Amendment rights

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First Amendment rights

We Protest

You don’t need to commit violence to conduct a large, effective public protest of perceived injustice. The many Tea Party demonstrations against our federal government’s latest socialist excesses prove that.

But what if violent and nonviolent protests are equated in the minds of peace keepers?

In Reason magazine, journalist Radly Balko reports on several disturbing examples of crackdowns of persons assembled in a public place. In one incident, motivated by the occasionally violent protests of last fall’s G-20 summit in Pittsburgh, police ordered students gathered in public to disperse forthwith, though they had broken no laws. Anyone who moved too slowly was subject to arrest. Apparently, a few violent protesters hit town for the summit, but they were a distinct minority.

Balko isn’t impressed by a university official’s claim that the gatherings had to be busted up because of the “potential” for trouble. That’s a dangerous standard to apply to peaceful assembly that is not only constitutionally protected but also an important bulwark against tyranny.

Police can make honest mistakes like anybody else, especially when in charged and confusing situations. No doubt there’s sometimes a fuzzy line between a peaceful if rowdy protest and one that’s turning violent. But Balko suggests that police are increasingly harassing and handcuffing people only because they are peacefully dissenting.

Not only is that not right, it demands protest.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Common Sense education and schooling First Amendment rights

No More Cruel and Unusual?

In recent years there’s been a spate of so-called “zero tolerance” policies — actually, zero common sense policies — in our schools, especially after Columbine and 9/11.

Last October in Delaware, six-year-old Zachary Christie faced 45 days of reform school for bringing a camping utensil to lunch. The gizmo combined a knife, fork and spoon. There was no evidence of evil intention. But the school thought their zero common sense policy against weapons had been violated. After a public outcry, the draconian punishment was dropped. The local school board modified some of its rules, though only for kindergartners and first-graders.

In Florida, lawmakers recently revised zero common sense policies statewide in hopes that only students who pose a genuine threat get expelled or arrested.

Hurray for any glimmer of a return to common sense. But why all these policies to begin with? Why instruct educators anywhere to respond maniacally to meaningless deviationism?

Maybe common sense and conscience are often the same thing.

Imagine if jay walking, littering and talking too loud in elevators were punished in comparably cruel and unusual fashion. Imagine judges and prosecutors always claiming they can’t distinguish between trivia and real crime — so better respond to both with equal force. Would we not accuse such meters-out of injustice of crimes of their own?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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First Amendment rights U.S. Constitution

A Holiday Declaration

Ten days before Christmas, America noted the 218th anniversary of the Bill of Rights . . . and I hadn’t even finished my own holiday shopping. I might wish that I could get you a pristine, enforceable Bill of RIghts, but it’s not just up to me.

It’s up to Congress, the Judicial branch, and the Executive as well. That’s a lot of people who need to be “on the same page.”

But it shouldn’t be impossible. The Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments, are short and clear. They easily fit on one page.

What you may not know, however, is that these amendments were based, in part, on a previous version known as the Virginia Declaration of Rights. The earlier version is helpful to establish context and eludicate meaning.

Perhaps even more interesting is the fact that some of the Declaration’s enumerated planks lack specificity. They serve as general reminders of how government is supposed to operate. Consider the 15th plank, which states that “no free government, or the blessings of liberty, can be preserved to any people but by a firm adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, frugality, and virtue and by frequent recurrence to fundamental principles.”

I hate to be the bearer of bad news on Christmas, but that sense of how government should work is no longer followed as the law of the land. Boy, I sure have a great idea for a New Year’s resolution.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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First Amendment rights

Arresting Developments

Gustavo Rendon was arrested in broad daylight — right in front of his two boys. One St. Louis policeman threatened that his boys would be sent into foster care.

Rendon’s crime? He passed out fliers in his neighborhood. He spoke out on public policy — in this case, opposing an eminent domain land grab and promoting a petition effort to put the city’s development plan to a vote.

Dave Roland, an attorney for the Show-Me Institute, says this outrageous behavior is part of “an unsettling pattern” . . . of squelching free speech.

Roland also points to St. Louis’s attempt to force Jim Roos to take down a sign protesting the city’s abuse of eminent domain — a case still in court. He mentions a recent instance where the Northeast Ambulance and Fire District actually sought to ban citizens from public meetings.

Roland’s “most disturbing” example concerns the Missouri Municipal League. The League has filed a lawsuit challenging the ballot titles for two anti-eminent domain abuse measures, effectively putting both petition drives on hold.

At a recent meeting of the Missouri Bar Association’s Eminent Domain Committee, Municipal League attorney Carrie Hermeling admitted that their “main objective” is “to delay the gathering of signatures.” Adding, “[H]opefully we’re accomplishing that.”

Thwarting the people, denying their basic rights — quite an accomplishment.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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First Amendment rights

Unliberating Bondage

Two big lies have been making the rounds about the proposed return of the FCC’s Fairness Doctrine. This is the rule that forced broadcasters to air “both sides” of controversial issues until the agency scuttled it in 1987.

One big lie is that critics of the doctrine shouldn’t worry because nobody is really thinking about reviving it. The other big lie, which sort of cancels out the first, is that the Fairness Doctrine should be re-imposed because it won’t restrict freedom of speech.

Writer Steve Almond argues the latter in a Boston Globe op-ed. He calls Fairness Doctrine foes “desperate and deluded” liars for saying it would assail their First Amendment rights.

But compulsion really is compulsion. Almond himself admits as much when he notes that conservative radio hosts worry that the Doctrine would “spell the end” of what he calls “their ongoing cultural flim-flam.” They would be forced half the time to turn their microphones over to the likes of Steve Almond. In this way, he says, Americans would be compelled to confront their biases.

Not that Almond is exactly an exemplar himself when it comes to pondering or tolerating alternative views. The Wall Street Journal’s James Taranto recalls that in 2006, Almond noisily resigned a teaching position at Boston College . . . because he disliked one of the speakers the college had invited to campus.

So much for hearing all sides.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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First Amendment rights too much government

The First Casualty of Health Care Reform

The first casualty of war is truth. The first casualty of health care reform? Free speech.

While most health care insurers have gone along with reform proposals, even helping write the bills, a few insurance companies fall outside the insiders’ perimeter, fearful of more regulation. The regulatory environment is already oppressive, after all — though, for the insurance industry these regs come mainly from the states.

So, we now learn, at least one medical insurance provider, Humana, sent out a special letter to policyholders who also participate in the Medicare Advantage program, advising them of what the effects of new reforms on their coverage would likely be.

What happened next?

If you guessed “gag order,” you got it.

After Humana’s expression of First Amendment rights, the Department of Health and Human Services told all insurers participating in Medicare Advantage to zip it, stifle themselves, express their thoughts in no way about any proposed reform to their policyholders — even if all such expression amounts to is a list of facts.

Penalties include both fines and jail time.

Yes, folks, this is what unlimited government means. Increase government’s role and “hasta la vista” to some very basic freedoms.

Just as government micromanagement of markets leads to shortages and rising prices, so increased government has predictable consequences. We pay for big government in lost freedom as well as dollars.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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First Amendment rights property rights too much government

California Crackdowns

A government agency practicing extortion . . . who’d’a thunk it?

In 1987, the California Coastal Commission lost a Supreme Court case about its attempt to demand beach access from property owners in exchange for building permits. One justice said it was practicing extortion.

Nevertheless, the agency still dictates what land owners must do to receive permits — which are required even to move piles of dirt around. In one instance, the unelected Commission ordered that most of an owner’s land be given over to farming. The Pacific Legal Foundation is fighting this insanity in court.

Richard Oshen decided to produce a documentary about the CCC after friends told him how it was interfering with their own property. The agency had even gone so far as to prohibit them from tape recording its inspection of their land.

Oshen spent years conducting interviews. He even managed to film a conversation with CCC head Peter Douglas in which Douglas downplayed the agency’s dictatorial powers. But Reason magazine reports that Douglas now wants to revoke the permission he gave to use that interview. He’s also demanding to see a pre-release version of the movie — either to try to prevent its release or just on general principles of harassing critics of tyranny.

I’ve reported on the commission before. It behaves as a kind of environmentalist mafia operating under color of law — and clearly the CCC is no fan of free speech.

Let’s hope that Douglas fails, Oshen succeeds, and California land owners get a reprieve.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
First Amendment rights national politics & policies

Stop Us Before We Kill Free Speech Again

The Supreme Court has yet another chance to refer to the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. And follow it.

The case before the court, Citizens United versus FEC, has to do with how federal campaign finance laws and the regulations issued by the Federal Election Commission are violating freedom of speech.

Citizens United is a conservative non-profit organization that produced a documentary critical of Hillary Clinton during the presidential campaign last year. A D.C. court ruled that producing it with the help of corporate funding was a violation campaign finance law, specifically the McCain-Feingold Act.

Eight former FEC commissioners have now filed an amicus brief in the case. They argue that the lower court’s decision violates the First Amendment — you know, the part about not making any law to abridge freedom of speech. One of the former commissioners, Hans von Spakovsky, explains in the Wall Street Journal that it is virtually impossible to know under the convoluted regulations exactly when one is allowed to engage in political speech and when one must shut up. Why not just let everyone exercise his First Amendment rights?

Spakovsky concludes that friends of campaign finance restrictions on speech have “lost sight of a basic truth: The answer to speech they disagree with is not to restrict that speech, but to answer it with more speech.”

That’s just — and this is — Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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First Amendment rights U.S. Constitution

See: Amendment, First

Will friends of freedom of speech catch a break this time?

Soon the U.S. Supreme Court will have another chance to rule that McCain-Feingold-style muzzling of political speech is heinously unconstitutional.

In September, before its regular new term begins, the high court will hear the case of Citizens United versus Federal Election Commission. This involves the standing of two rulings. One is a 1990 ruling banning corporate funding of political campaigns does not violate the First Amendment. A 2003 ruling upholds a ban on corporate speech that even utters the name of a political candidate.

Does the Constitution permit or prohibit stuffing gags in our mouths to prevent us from speaking out of turn? Supporters of Campaign Finance Repression like to say that they’re only regulating the spending of money, not speech. Of course, human beings lack the power to engage in mass long-range telepathy. The only speech that costs nothing is the kind you utter to somebody sitting next to you in the room. Would the regulators claim that limiting the money newspapers can spend on printing presses or websites leaves them with unencumbered “freedom of speech”?

The First Amendment is explicit. “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press.” You make a law abridging the means of speaking, and you are abridging freedom of speech.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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First Amendment rights initiative, referendum, and recall

Who Is John Lilburne?

Now that Citizens in Charge Foundation has given the John Lilburne Award to ten defenders of petition rights — most recently, to Oregon State Senator Vicki Walker — it seems time to talk to friends of Common Sense about the award and about Mr. Lilburne.

I founded Citizens in Charge Foundation to help put citizens in control of their own government. Voting for elected officials is one important means of doing that. But it’s not enough to prevent career politicians from ganging up on us and often ruthlessly stomping our liberties. We need ways to produce a better political result when politicians stonewall. That’s why Citizens in Charge Foundation promotes the right of initiative and referendum.

John Lilburne was a 17th-century political activist who pioneered the use of petitioning and referendums to redress governmental abuse of power. He was a leader of a radical democratic movement called the Levelers during the time of the English Civil War. He advocated religious liberty, wider suffrage, and equality before the law.

Critics saw Lilburne and his allies as trying to bring everybody down to the same level. Hence the label Levelers, intended to be pejorative. I view Lilburne as trying to bring everybody up to the same level — of democratic rights.

Each month, the Citizens in Charge Foundation gives the John Lilburne Award to a person who is particularly praiseworthy in pursuing the same goal.

So here’s to John Lilburne — a champion of the rights of everyday citizens.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.